Spaghetti Pie

Spaghetti pie is a dish that a lot of people use to recycle leftovers. It’s sort of like the bastard offspring of pizza and lasagna. My mother makes a good version of the dish, but I’ve had to make a few tweaks to her formula to accommodate the fact that the wife doesn’t like eggs. I still use eggs as a thickener, but not as many as most people use, and my version is a little simplified compared to the others I’ve seen.

This recipe makes a spaghetti pie the diameter of a large pizza and twice as thick.

Spaghetti Pie

½ pound cooked spaghetti

1½ cups spaghetti sauce

15 oz ricotta cheese

½ cup parmesan cheese

4 oz mozzarella cheese

4 eggs, beaten, divided

salt and pepper

assorted toppings

Get out your leftover spaghetti and red sauce. Grease a pizza pan with a little olive oil or nonstick spray.

Preheat an oven to 350°. Measure out the parmesan cheese. In a large mixing bowl, scramble three eggs along with about 2/3 of the parmesan. Add a big pinch each of salt and pepper. Add the cold noodles to the egg/cheese mixture and stir until evenly coated. Press the noodles into an even layer in the pizza pan.

In the same bowl, mix the ricotta, egg, the remaining parmesan cheese, and another big pinch each of salt and pepper. Stir until smooth and then spoon over the noodles in an even layer.

Spoon the red sauce over the ricotta mixture in another even layer and bake for 15 minutes to let the egg and the noodles firm into a crust.

After 15 minutes in the oven, top the warm pie with mozzarella cheese and whatever toppings you like. My mother sautees a medley of onions, peppers, and sausage as a topping. My red sauce already has onions and peppers in it, so I usually just add whatever’s in the fridge or in the garden. This pie features sausage, cherry tomatoes, and basil.

Bake for another 15 minutes. When it’s done, slice the pie like a pizza and serve. The longer you bake the spaghetti pie, the crispier the noodles will get. From this angle, you can see how the noodles meld into a unified crust.

This is really good, and it’s a great way to make the most of your leftover spaghetti.